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Three tips for a resume makeover
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There’s nothing like a recession to drag resumes out of file draws and the darkest reaches of hard drives.
Dust yours off and take a good look at it, even if you don’t think you need it just yet. As I’ve said before (and will say again) a resume is the shorthand version of who you are professionally and is handy to have around to give or email to anyone who wants to know more about you—colleagues, clients, people you network with at conferences and so on.
To assist you with your long-overdue resume update, here is a roundup of the tips I pass along most often to friends and colleagues when I help them with their resumes.
Your resume is not the unabridged history of you
No one wants to know every task you’ve done in every job you’ve ever held. They want to know about the skills and experience that are relevant to the job opening they have. Everything else is just pesky static.
So edit accordingly.
For example, if you’ve significantly changed careers or shifted your focus, feel free to leave jobs from earlier in your career off of your resume.
As far as the jobs that you do list, emphasize the work that will make you most desirable for the job you’re applying for and then be brutal about deleting the rest.
Over the course of my career I’ve shifted from being a financial reporter who writes about stocks and mutual funds and spends a lot of time sifting through annual reports to a more general business reporter who covers careers, entrepreneurs, consumer topics and the environment. I still have to read a balance sheet now and again, but it’s how I spend most of my time—thank goodness.
To make my resume fit on one page I’ve stopped listing my first job as a reporting assistant at the Dow Jones news wire. If anyone ever asks me how I spent the year and a half between college and the first job I list, I’ll tell them, “I worked at the Dow Jones News Service, but it’s not really relevant to what we’re talking about.”
But you know what? No one’s ever asked. Once you’re over 30, no one cares what you did when you were 22. They assume it was entry level and not all that important.
Choose clarity over accuracy
Suppose at your current company you are considered an associate, but anywhere else in the industry your business card would say program manager. What do you put on the resume?
The answer is easy: Put “program manager.” It’s not technically accurate but it’s clear and will more effectively communicate to people who you are and what you do.
On my own resume I ditched titles completely a long time ago. Why risk distract hiring managers from the really important stuff, which is, the things I accomplished in those jobs.
Look at your job descriptions with the same critical eye.
Include industry jargon, buzzwords and acronyms that are used on the websites or want ads of the company you are sending your resume to. And leave them in when they help to technically knowledgeable and up on industry trends. But otherwise use plain English to explain your work.
If you want to be sure your resume is readable, give it to a friend or family member who isn’t in your field and see whether they can understand how you spend your time.
Give up on the idea of a final version of your resume
Give up on the idea that you will eventually have a final version of your resume that will serve all of your purposes. This idea went way with the heavy stock paper I used to type my resume on.
In this electronic age leaving your resume stagnant would mean missing opportunities to put your best foot forward and making the most of your word processing program.
I have what I consider to be a template. It contains the most thorough and general information about my work history. It’s resume I pass along when someone simply wants to know what I’ve done.
But I tweak before I apply for a job or send it to a potential client. Depending n the situation I might dial up my editing experience or emphasize work with particular publications, or highlight the work that demonstrates certain expertise, like career advice.
It’s not lying or padding my resume. It’s mostly editing other stuff down so that the things I really want people to know about me stand out.
In short, a resume isn’t a full biography but rather a tool you use to market yourself. Think about the impression you want to make on someone and which details of your professional history best relate the story you want to tell.
Now, get cranking!
For more information:
• CareerJournal.com has a plethora of resume advice
• Career coach Allison Cheston offers good advice on resume formats
• If you need a professional to help you edit or recreate your resume, contact me
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